diesel-ram

Allpar has known of plans for the Ram 1500 diesel for years; by 2010, we had learned that the Cummins V6 had been packaged into the Ram engine bay. The Fiat purchase and falling gasoline prices put the project on hold until now.

Today, Ram officially announced that they will build a Ram 1500 with the VM 3.0 diesel engine ; while VM is owned by Fiat, the company has long supplied Chrysler with diesel engines for  vehicles sold outside of North America. The 3.0 liter V6 is a state of the art diesel which passes both American and European emissions tests, has strong power, low maintenance requirements, and good economy.  This is the same diesel engine used in the 2014 Jeep Grand Cherokee, which will reduce training and inventory costs when compared with the also laudable Cummins V6 diesel (a completely different engine than the Cummins straight-six which will continue in the Ram Heavy Duty models).

The diesel will, not surprisingly, be hooked up to the eight-speed automatic. It is possible that the delay in launching the Ram 1500 Diesel was due partly to the desire to start it off with the right automatic; the eight-speed's wide range and high number of gears will keep the diesel in its sweet spot and counter the relatively low operating range of most diesel engines.

Allpar predicted that the VM engine had been approved for the Ram 1500 on June 4, 2012, then again on October 5, 2012, and October 23, 2012. The timing (diesel Ram 1500 in late 2013) appeared on April 1, 2012. Ram actually showed a 1500 diesel option in its ordering system in December 2010.

The Ram 1500 diesel is scheduled to start production in July, which would make it available in dealerships between August and September, assuming no delays.

Dodge’s lightest-duty full-size pickups have been available with diesel engines before; in 1978, Dodge started using a four-liter Mitsubishi 6DR5 diesel , also found in the Toyota Land Cruiser, in pickups and Power Wagons.

Dodge truck diesels